Tag: drug-abuse

Poodie James

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excerpt

This was bound to be about the Poodie James story. Sonny’s face
was reddening. That meant they had a problem, but Sonny ran the
newsroom. She would not jump in. She reached for the pile of budget
sheets on her desk and got back to work, envying the editor and
reporter wrestling with a story. My god, would the price of newsprint
ever stabilize? She sank into the pages of figures, enjoying the whir
and the rhythm as she cranked the handle of the adding machine.
“Got a minute?” Winifred looked up at Sonny standing in her
doorway, with Pease a step behind him. “Ned has something you
ought to know about.” She pushed the budget aside.
“Well, Ned,” she said after she had heard Pease’s story, “nice
work, I must say. Poor George Pearson, carrying that around all
these years. But we can’t go with it. Sonny is right, it’s hearsay. The
hobo, Clarkson, thinks he saw Torgerson that night. You say
Clarkson told you Torgerson denied it. This certainly could
explain the mayor’s hatred of Poodie James, but we need the other
man to confirm Pearson’s story. Even then, Torgerson may not
confess. Have you gone back to Pearson to try to get the name?”
“Yes. He’s terrified,” Pease said. He won’t tell me any more. I
think he has visions of prison. He probably doesn’t know the statute
of limitations on assault.“
“More likely he has visions of his reputation and his business
going to hell,” Sonny said. “And he has a point.”
“I don’t know any other way to find out who was with
Torgerson and Pearson that night,” Pease said.
Winifred straightened up and fixed her gaze on the middle distance.
“I think I might,” she said after a few seconds. She pulled a
scrap of paper from a desk drawer, reached for the telephone,
propped the handset on her shoulder, started dialing and shooed
the men out of her office. They watched from Sonny’s desk. After
she hung up, she waved them back in.
“Ned,” she said, “you’re about to meet your first madam.” She
gave him a look of appraisal. “I hope she’s your first.”

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In the Quiet After Slaughter

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– I guess we better get going, I said. We don’t wanna miss our rendezvous.
Burt didn’t budge. Finally he said, Ain’t gonna be no rendezvous.
He loosened the flaps of his pack and spilled its contents.
River rock. I dumped mine — the same.
– What’s going on, Burt?
– Ain’t no satellite receiver, little brother. Those two buggered off
long ago. And look, he said, fingering the napkin map and peering
over the edge into the ravine. They were hoping we’d have ourselves
a little accident.
– But this cable! And the TV store!
Burt chuckled. The van was leased, he said. The TV store was
rented by the month.
I still wasn’t convinced.
– I was checking on my stash one night when I overheard the two
of them talking. It was all Swanson’s idea. He’s done this before.
Bud’s his stooge.
– And?
– I told the cops everything. Those two are probably in cuffs by
now.
Burt removed a nylon bag from his pack.
– Open it, he said.
It was stuffed with paper money, and plenty of it.
– Explain, Burt . . .
– While Bud was trying to find mine, I was looking for his. A couple
of times we almost bumped into each other. With a little help
from a friend, I found his first. All the share money, his cut of the TV
sales.
My brother separated the money into three piles and pointed to
the tallest. The bills were stacked like a column of Chinese characters.
– I figure we’d turn this in, he said. It belongs to Aunt Peggy and
the others. But this one—he stuffed the second pile into the pack—
is ours. After all, folks have their TVs.
– And the third?
– That’s for cousin Mark. A reward. He’s the one found a couple
of Bud’s chewed-up toothpicks down by the river and suggested we
start digging.

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Poodie James

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excerpt

“I’m glad to see you’re not hiding, Mr. Clarkson,” Pease said.
Fred hoisted himself up on an elbow and regarded the young
man. “Not hiding and still not talking about myself,” he said.
“I thought perhaps you’d be willing to confirm what I found out
about your background before we go with the story. It was fairly
simple to trace you through the state bar association. You had an
impressive career in the law.”
“Now, why would anyone care about that, Mr. Pease? It’s
ancient history.”
“I suppose no one would care if you hadn’t made yourself a hero
in the train rescue and come so eloquently to the defense of Poodie
James at the council hearing.”
Engine Fred indicated the captain’s chair. “Have a seat. I’ve been
thinking of something that might interest your readers far more than
anything you could write about this old hobo. Want to hear about it?”
“Do I sense the offer of a deal?” Pease said.
Fred’s eyebrows went up. “Does that offend your journalistic
sensibilities?”
“It depends on the nature of the deal and the quality of the
information,” Pease said.
Fred fell silent while he studied Pease’s schoolboy face, its earnestness,
its shock of hair over the forehead, the glasses losing their
struggle to stay in place. Pease returned his gaze without moving
his eyes, without a flicker of expression.
“Do you know the story of Poodie James being attacked and
beaten shortly after he moved to this valley?” Fred said.
“As of two days ago, I do,” Pease told him. “Winifred Stone told
me about it shortly before the council hearing. She directed me to
the clipping in our morgue. Sketchy story. Not much to go on. It’s
interesting that someone was attacking hobos around the same
time. 1927, a long time ago.”
“Matter of perspective,” Engine Fred said. “Seems like yesterday.
Still, it’s been sketchy for me, too, until recently.”
Pease looked at Fred, saying nothing, waiting.

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Poodie James

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excerpt

“There’s no mistaking it, Mr. Mayor. I saw your face for fully
half a minute before you bucked me off and made your escape. I
have never forgotten your eyes, your distinctive eyes. I thought I
recognized you from the back of the hall when you spoke, but I had
to be certain. You know, indeed you know, what I’m talking
about.”
Torgerson glared across his desk at Engine Fred. “You expect
people to believe something dredged up from twenty years ago?”
Fred smiled. “I didn’t say how long ago it was, but your memory
is fairly accurate. It has been twenty-one years. Poodie James and I
were discussing it just this morning. As for people believing it, I
hope that it won’t be necessary for anyone to know. That includes
Poodie.”
“What do you mean?” Torgerson said.
“Poodie doesn’t know who beat him up. He doesn’t know who
attacked Old Sam, and he doesn’t know, as he puts it so simply,
why you don’t like him.”
Glowering at Engine Fred, Torgerson said, “I could have you
thrown out of here.”
“Yes, you could.”
Torgerson got up, turned around and stood looking at cars passing
on the street below. “What do you want?”
“I don’t know why you beat Poodie James when you were a
young man. I don’t know why you are persecuting him now. It
doesn’t matter. I want you to leave him alone, Mr. Torgerson. Just
leave him alone.”
Torgerson spun around and leaned across the desk. “I’ll tell you
why, mister. Because he’s a freak, an unclean little freak. He contaminates
the town. He should have left after he got his warning, but he
stayed here, dragging that wagon around, rummaging through peoples’
garbage, bothering children. All those things you said in the
hearing, all those things Gritzinger said, that’s crap. Poodie James is
nothing but a bum and a beggar. He’s bad for the town.”

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In the Quiet After Slaughter

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excerpt

Dennis was a top student, the school rep at the Science Fair.
Afternoons he skinned cats.
– Whatcha watching?
– Show about bugs, replied young Ronnie. Fucking stupid.
Dennis whispered, Got any smoke?
Mrs. Stinson appeared, a towel around her head. Beads of hair
colouring sluiced across her forehead.
– Burt still not going to Aunt Peggy’s? she asked.
The only way the Stinsons could have known about Burt’s recalcitrance
was if someone had told them. Someone like Mom.
Times like that I’d get these pictures in my head. I could see Al
Stinson disguising his voice and mumbling threats into a telephone,
the three conspirators having a good laugh afterwards. My brother
knew about my visions. He figured I had psychic powers.
Aunt Peggy was waiting for us at the bus station. With her was Bud,
the latest boyfriend, and Mark, our cousin.
Bud walked bull-legged and sucked on a toothpick. Mark was an
awkward 12-year-old with eyes the colour of blue marbles. Aunt
Peggy said he wore his cub uniform everywhere.
– Are you a Sixer yet? asked Burt. Before developing other interests,
my brother had been a pack leader himself.
– I need one more badge, Mark said. Knots.
The five of us squeezed into the cab of Bud’s pickup. Mark and his
dripping Popsicle sat on my lap.
Bud said, Don’t blink, fellas, you’ll miss the highlights.
The town of Coppermine was divided by the Similkameen River,
a marauding deluge of glacier-cold aqua roaring through a steep
gorge. Mountains loomed on all sides, leaving the few thousand residents
in shade for all but a couple of hours a day. The mountains
also blocked TV reception.
A bridge joined the wealthier west side of town with the poorer
east. The narrow wooden span was a popular meeting spot for teens.
A resentful congregation dissolved at our crossing.
– That road there, said Aunt Peggy, indicating a gap in the trees,
leads to the Cherry Creek Indian Reserve. They say all this land
belongs to them.

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Poodie James

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excerpt

“I came here to say what I know about hobos.You have been
told that we mean no harm. I believe that we cause none.”
Engine Fred paused to look at Stout. “No more harm than most
people do, and less than some.” He turned toward Torgerson and
halted again.
The room was suspended in silence.
“But now, this hearing about hobos turns into an attack on the
best, the bravest man I have known. He came to help after the train
ran off the tracks near the hobo jungle. If he hadn’t, I could not
have got the engineer out of the cab. I probably would have been
blown up trying. Mr. Stout says that Poodie James is my accomplice.
He says that Mr. James and I caused the train wreck so that
we could make ourselves look good. That is offensive, Mr. Stout. It
is also slanderous.”
The fat on Stout’s face quivered as he ratcheted his head in
Torgerson’s directon and back to Engine Fred.
“’If,’ I said. That’s what I said, ‘If.’ I was only raising a possibility.”
Stout’s voice had lost some of its vigor.
Engine Fred took a step in Stout’s direction. “That is the
defense of a bully and a coward. You made an accusation, Mr.
Stout.” He looked at Torgerson. “It did not occur to you that the
hobo or his accomplice would defend against it.”
He’s even better than I remembered, Sam Winter thought.
“Mr. Clarkson,” Spear’s voice cut through the tension, “under
the hearing rules, you may make a statement and answer questions.
You may not engage in debate.”
“Mr. Spear,” Engine Fred said, with the trace of a smile, “you’re
trying to be fair, of course. I’ll observe the rule.” He stepped back to
the lectern.
“I told the council that Poodie James is the bravest man I have
known. That is so not because he risked his life to save someone. It is
so because under circumstances that would defeat most of us, he lives
his life with independence, dignity and joy. He does not accept charity
and he does not seek institutional help. He makes his own way, gathering
and selling discarded newspapers and bottles.

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Poodie James

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excerpt

“From the standpoint of the police department,” Mr. Stout,
“things are well in hand.”
Spear waited for the crowd to settle down. “Now we come to the
matter of the train derailment and fire a while back.” For the first
time, Engine Fred thought, Spear seemed unsure of himself. “It
has been suggested that hobos from the jungle interfered with the
train and had help from someone in the neighborhood.”
Whispers coursed through the room. Albert Swan cleared his
throat. Clever of Torgerson, Spanger thought, to plant that notion
with Spear and let his political enemy make it public. “I’ve heard
the theory,” he said.
“I know you investigated personally, Chief. What did you find
out?”
“The railroad’s investigator told me the accident was the fault of
poor track maintenance. He said there was no evidence of sabotage.
We’re waiting for his formal report, but that was his finding.”
“And what do you think, Chief Spanger?” The question came
from Stout.
“I think that the head accident investigator for the Great Northern
knows his job. There is no reason to doubt him. Besides, why
would a hobo who depends on trains for his transportation want to
wreck one? Doesn’t make sense.”
“It might,” Stout said, leaning forward, “if the hobo and his
accomplice wrecked the train so they could come to the rescue and
be heroes.” He shifted his heft to the back of the chair. A buzz ran
through the audience.
So that was it, Sam Winter thought, the crackpot scheme to
draw Poodie James into the mayor’s campaign against hobos was in
the open without Torgerson’s having to spring it himself. He
looked over at Clarkson. Engine Fred sat staring at the front of the
room.
Spanger’s voice took on an edge. “That is a serious charge of
criminal activity, Mr. Stout. There is no evidence to support it,
none whatever.” Stout shrugged and gave Spanger a faint smile.

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In the Quiet After Slaughter

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excerpt

He was making his way to the bar when a stranger blocked his
advance.
– What you want? the man said. One eye had been inexpertly
sewn shut. Dis a private establishment, pilgrim.
Redman’s muscles twitched. He enjoyed a good row, it was a
Yukon sport, but on his first night out? Besides, the fellow had
shoulders broad as a linebacker. His fists were the size of five-pin
bowling balls.
– You best turn around, mon.
Redman feigned resignation, retreated a few steps — but then
pushed into the crowd. Convinced he’d lost Cyclops, he slipped into
a vacant seat and ordered a beer.
A few drinks later a girl approached his table and began dancing.
Her plump black thighs glistened with perspiration. She had breasts
and lips women like Marge would pay to replicate. Her hair was a
tangle of dreadlocks.
Ace jumped to his feet and began to move.
Boom-boom-ba-boom . . .
Oh, yeah.
The girl led him deeper into the crush of dancers. And then he
was being nudged into the washroom, its only exit blocked. The girl
was waved away.
– What I tell you, mon, huh? Dis place not for your kind.
There were machetes and at least one pistol tucked into a waistband.
All attached to four very large and fierce Caribes. The Cyclops
appeared to be their leader.
– You a crazy motha, know that, pilgrim?
The heat and the booze had caught up to Redman. He was out of
gas and the odds were against him. So he approached the man with
one eye squeezed shut and played his only hand.
His name, he said, was Johnny Cool, and you bet he needed a job. It
seemed most able-bodied men on the island did. He was in the lobby
sucking on sugar cane when Redman stepped from the elevator the
next morning.
– The dancer, she yours? he asked.
– Dey all mine.
– Have her checked out. I’ll want to see the certificate.

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Poodie James

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excerpt

“Is there anything you’d like to add?” Spear asked.
“Just that something ought to be done to control these hobos.”
Spear banged his gavel to quiet another outbreak of chattering.
Pearson avoided looking at Torgerson. He felt the mayor’s gaze
follow him when he made his way to a seat in the audience. Those
eyes, Engine Fred thought. That man’s eyes are as cold as ice.
The next man at the lectern said, “I am Richard Brown, counsel
for the Great Northern Railway, here at the request of Mayor Peter
B. Torgerson. I have a short statement, Mr. President.”
“We don’t have a president, Mr. Brown,” Spear said. “I’m just
the man in charge today. Go ahead, please.”
“The Great Northern Railway prohibits passengers on its
freight trains and trespassers in its rail yards and rights of way.
Railroad detectives who apprehend violators hold them for local
law enforcement agencies and file appropriate complaints. That is
company policy in a nutshell. I am happy to answer your
questions.”
Spear looked up from the briefing paper he had begun to read,
his eyes wide.
“You said you are a lawyer, Mr. Brown?
“By training and license, yes, sir.”
“That is the shortest speech I have ever heard from a lawyer.”
People in the chamber chuckled.
“My question is this,” Spear said, “what does your railroad do to
keep hobos off the trains in the first place?
Brown appeared to be studying the air above Spear’s head.
‘’As I explained, our detectives regularly pull transients off the
trains, run them out of the yards and have the police arrest them.
Vagrancy convictions don’t put hobos in jail for long, and they’re
soon back on the road.”
Frank Stout strained himself upright in his chair. “So, what will
your railroad do to help us get rid of these bums? That’s what the
people of this town want to know.”
“The Great Northern, sir, is not authorized to interfere in local
policy or local law enforcement, nor do we wish to do so.

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Poodie James

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excerpt

Sam thought about the trajectory of his own career, the comfort
of his retirement, the adventure of his new work on the bench. He
wasn’t sure that he could trust words to say what he felt. He offered
his hand to the big man sitting in the coppery sunshine on the
stoop of Poodie’s cabin. Engine Fred grasped it and smiled.
“I talk too much,” he said.
As Sam backed his car around and headed down the lane,
Engine Fred shambled up the path through the bunch grass
toward the jungle. Poodie hefted the three boxes of reds into a
stack next to the cabin. He would put them on the wagon and take
them to Ralph Gritzinger at the market. With his apple money,
ten or twelve dollars a week from newspapers and bottles and what
he made stocking shelves and doing odd jobs for Gritzinger, he
was all right, he thought. He had a place to stay and people who
helped him. The YMCA let him swim laps in the indoor pool now
that the city pool was closed for the season. He wondered what
would happen to a man like him in another country, another time.
What would the Egyptians 4000 years ago have done with an
undersized deaf man whose talk was hard to understand, who
walked badly? Would the Pharaoh’s master builders have wanted
him to work on the pyramids? Maybe, he thought, if he was lucky.
Most likely, he would starve. He walked out into the field where
the orchard used to be and turned to face his cabin and trees. If he
was from a nice neighborhood in town, wouldn’t he think the
cabin was too small, too run down and dirty for anyone to live in,
with no running water and no bathroom? If he were an Egyptian
slave from 2680 BC, wouldn’t he think that living in such a place
would be a blessing?
He was blessed, he told himself; a lucky man. He would hate the
jobs the school for the deaf wanted him to take, fixing furniture,
repairing shoes, inside all the time, stuck in a routine. Poodie
thought about how hard most folks in the valley worked to pay for
their houses, buy their cars, raise their children. He thought about
Dan and Ruth Thorp losing their orchard and their house.

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